A Canyon Voyage / The Narrative of the Second Powell Expedition down the Green-Colorado River from Wyoming, and the Explorations on Land, in the Years 1871 and 1872

by Frederick Samuel Dellenbaugh

From Top of Granite, South Side near Bright Angel Creek.

The next day was Sunday, September 1st, and after the Major had climbed the south wall for observations we started once more on a powerful current. For the first three miles there was a continuous rapid with no opportunity to land. We dashed through waves that tossed us badly and filled the boats half full and then half full again before we had a chance to bail. In fifteen minutes we made the three miles and a half mile more, to arrive at a heavy rapid, which we ran and in two miles reached another with fearful waves, which we also ran. In one Jones was overbalanced by his oar hitting the top of a big wave behind the boat and he was knocked out. He clung by his knees and hands, his back in the water, and the boat careened till I thought she would go over. We could not move to help him without upsetting and were compelled to leave him to his own resources. In some way he succeeded in scrambling back. The waves were tremendous and sometimes seemed to come from all directions at once. There were whirlpools, too, that turned us round in spite of every effort to prevent it. The river was about one hundred and fifty feet wide. After an extremely strenuous morning we halted on the right for dinner, continuing as soon as we had disposed of it. Presently we arrived at a sharp fall of about twenty feet, where we made a portage, and waited at the foot for the photographers to take some negatives and also for repairing the Cañonita. Finally it was decided to camp on the spot. It was Camp 100. Our record for the day was a trifle over seven miles with nine rapids run and one portage.

Almost the first thing in the morning of September 2d was a portage, after which we had fair water for two or three miles, and then reached a very heavy fall, where we landed on the left and had dinner before making another portage. This accomplished, we proceeded on a river still rising and ran a great many bad rapids, some of them having tremendous falls. In one the fierce current set against the cliff so strongly that we were carried within an oar's length of it, notwithstanding our severe effort to avoid so close an acquaintance with the rough wall. Even between rapids the velocity of the water was extremely high and we flew along at terrific speed, while in the huge waves of the rapids the boats leaped and plunged with startling violence. Toward night a sudden halt was made on the left to examine a bad-looking place half a mile below. The Major and Prof. tried to climb where they could get a good view of it, but they failed. The Major said we would run it in the morning, though Prof. was dubious about the feasibility of doing so successfully and said he thought it about the worst place we had yet seen. We camped on a rocky talus where we were. A small sandbank was found nearby for our beds, and we made another discovery, a small pool of clear, pure water, a rare treat after the muddy Colorado which we had been drinking for so long. Twenty rapids were placed to our credit for this one day in a trifle over fifteen miles, and we felt that we were vanquishing the Grand Canyon with considerable success.

Our life now was so strenuous every hour of the day that our songs were forgotten, and when night came every man was so used up that as soon as supper was over rest and sleep were the only things that interested us. Though our beds were as hard and rough as anything could be, we slept with the intensity of the rocks themselves, and it never seemed more than a few minutes before we were aroused by the Major's rising signal "Oh-ho, boys!" and rose to our feet to pack the blankets in the rubber bags, sometimes with a passing thought as to whether we would ever take them out again. For my part, never before nor since have I been so tired. One night when the Major called us to look out for the boats I did not hear him and no one waked me so I slept on, learning about it only the next morning. Our food supply was composed partly of jerked beef, and as this could not be put in rubber because of the grease it became more or less damp and there developed in it a peculiar kind of worm, the largest about an inch long, with multitudinous legs. There were a great many of them and they gave the beef a queer taste. In order to clear the sacks as far as possible of these undesirable denizens I several times emptied them on wide smooth rocks, and while the worms were scrambling around I scraped up the beef without many of them, but could not get rid of all. Andy's method of cooking this beef was to make a gravy with bacon fat and scorched flour and then for a few moments stew the beef in the gravy. Ordinarily this made a very palatable dish but the peculiar flavour of the beef now detracted from it, though we were so hungry that we could eat anything without a query, and our diminishing supply of rations forbade the abandonment of the valuable beef.

When we arose on the morning of September 3d the dubious rapid was tossing its huge waves exactly as on the night before and humanity seemed to be out of the reckoning. By eight o'clock we were ready for it, and with everything in good trim we pushed off. The current was strong from the start, and a small rapid just below camp gave additional speed, so that we were soon bearing down on the big one with wild velocity. The river dropped away abruptly, to rise again in a succession of fearful billows whose crests leaped and danced high in air as if rejoicing at the prospect of annihilating us. Just then the Major changed his mind as to running the place, for now standing on the boat's deck he could see it better than before from the region of our camp. He ordered us to pull hard on our left, intending to land at a spot that was propitious on the left or south bank, but no sooner had he given this command than he perceived that no landing above the fall was possible. He gave another order which put us straight in the middle again and down we flew upon the descent. The Major as usual had put on his life-preserver and I think Jones had on his, but Jack and I, as was our custom, placed ours inflated immediately behind our seats, not wishing to be hampered by them. The plunge was exceedingly sharp and deep, and then we found ourselves tossing like a chip in a frightful chaos of breakers which almost buried us, though the boats rose to them as well as any craft possibly could. I bailed with a camp kettle rapidly and Jack did the same, but the boat remained full to the gunwales as we were swept on. We had passed the worst of it when, just as the Dean mounted a giant wave at an angle perhaps of forty or fifty degrees, the crest broke in a deluge against the port bow with a loud slap. In an instant we were upside-down going over to starboard. I threw up my hand instinctively to grasp something, and luckily caught hold of a spare oar which was carried slung on the side, and by this means I pulled myself above water. My hat was pasted down over my eyes. Freeing myself from this I looked about. Bottom up the boat was clear of the rapid and sweeping on down with the swift, boiling current toward a dark bend. The Cañonita was nowhere to be seen. No living thing was visible. The narrow black gorge rose in sombre majesty to the everlasting sky. What was a mere human life or two in the span of eternity? I was about preparing to climb up on the bottom of the boat when I perceived Jones clinging to the ring in the stern, and in another second the Major and Jack shot up alongside as if from a gun. The whole party had been kept together in a kind of whirlpool, and the Major and Jack had been pulled down head first till, as is the nature of these suctions on the Colorado, it suddenly changed to an upward force and threw them out into the air.

There was no time to lose, for we did not wish to go far in this condition; another rapid might be in waiting around the corner. Jack and I carefully got up on the bottom, leaving the Major at the bow and Jones at the stern, and leaning over we took hold of the starboard gunwale under water, and throwing ourselves back quickly together we brought the Dean up on her keel, though she came near rolling clear over the other way. She was even full of water, but the cabins supported her. Jack helped me in and then I balanced his effort so as not to capsize again. The bailing kettles were gone, but as our hats had strangely enough remained on our heads through it all we bailed with them as fast as possible for a few seconds till we lowered the water sufficiently to make it safe to get the others on board. The Major came aft along the gunwale and I helped him in, then Jack helped Jones. The oars, fortunately, had not come out of the locks, thanks to our excellent arrangement, and grasping them, without trying to haul in the bow line trailing a hundred feet in the water, we pulled hard for a slight eddy on the left where we perceived a footing on the rocks, and as soon as we were near enough I caught up the rope, made the leap, and threw the bight over a projection, where I held the boat while Jack and Jones bailed rapidly and set things in order so that we could go to the assistance of the Cañonita. The Major's Jurgenssen chronometer had stopped at 8:26:30 from the wetting.

The Cañonita, being more lightly laden than the Dean, and also not meeting the peculiar coincidence of mounting a wave at the instant it broke, came down with no more damage than the loss of three oars and the breaking of a rowlock. Probably if the Major had sat down on the deck instead of in the chair we might also have weathered the storm.[34] About a mile and a half below we made a landing at a favourable spot on the right, where the cargoes were spread out to dry and the boats were overhauled, while the Major and I climbed up the wall to where he desired to make a geological investigation. We joked him a good deal about his zeal in going to examine the geology at the bottom of the river, but as a matter of fact he came near departing by that road to another world.

We were now in an exceedingly difficult part of the granite gorge, for, at the prevailing stage of water, landings were either highly precarious or not possible at all, so we could not examine places before running, and could not always make a portage where we deemed it necessary. There were also all manner of whirlpools and bad places. Starting on about three o'clock we descended several rapids in about six miles, when we saw one ahead that looked particularly forbidding. The granite came down almost vertically to the water, projecting in huge buttresses that formed a succession of little bays, especially on the left, where we manœuvred in and out, keeping close against the rocks, the current there being slack. The plan was for me to be ready, on turning the last point, to jump out on some rocks we had noticed from above not far from the beginning of the rapid. As we crept around the wall I stood up with the bight of the line in one hand, while Jack pulled in till we began to drift down stern foremost alongshore. At the proper moment I made my leap exactly calculated. Unluckily at the instant the capricious Colorado threw a "boil" up between the bow and the flat rock I was aiming at, turning the bow out several feet, and instead of landing where I intended I disappeared in deep water. I clung to the line and the acceleration of the boat's descent quickly pulled me back to the surface. She was gliding rapidly past more rocks and the Major jumped for them with the purpose of catching the rope, but they were so isolated and covered with rushing water that he had all he could do to take care of himself. Jones then tried the same thing, but with the same result. Jack stuck to his post. I went hand over hand to the bow as fast as I could, and reaching the gunwale I was on board in a second. One of my oars had somehow come loose, but Jack had caught it and now handed it to me. We took our places and surveyed the chances. Apparently we were in for running the rapid stern foremost and we prepared for it, but in the middle of the stream there was a rock of most gigantic proportions sloping up the river in such a way that the surges alternately rolled upon it and then slid back. Partly up the slope we were drawn by this power, and on the down rush the boat turned and headed diagonally just right for reaching the left bank. We saw our opportunity and, pulling with every muscle, lodged the Dean behind a huge boulder at the very beginning of the main rapid, where I made the line fast in the twinkle of an eye. Meanwhile the Major had hastily scrambled up to where he could see down the canyon, and he heard Jack's hearty shout of "All right!" Lowering the Dean a couple of rods farther to a sandbank at the mouth of a gulch we went into camp feeling that we had done enough river work for one day, and the Cañonita's crew without accident lowered down to the same place before Andy had supper ready. My hat had come off in my deep plunge and beyond this I did not have one. Near by was a small clear spring that gave us another treat of palatable water, the Colorado now being muddier than ever, as it was still on the rise, coming up three feet more while we were here. The entire day's run was eight and one-eighth miles. The Major and Prof. succeeded in getting down three miles on foot to reconnoitre.